Overwatch makes it harder to get the same maps in back-to-back matches
Blizzard wants to prevent recent maps from appearing in voting and stop Escort and Hybrid from dominating the available choices.
Overwatch has over 30 maps currently available for Standard Play, split between Escort, Hybrid, Control, Push, and Flashpoint. And if you are playing the game regularly, you probably have noticed that it tends to roll between the same maps over and over again, and Escort and Hybrid come up way more often than the other modes.
Well, this changed with Season 5. Blizzard has introduced a couple of adjustments to map voting that went a little bit unnoticed.
Escort and Hybrid Are Not Dominating Anymore
Blizzard made essentially two important changes when it comes to Map Voting.
The first one prevents your last two matches' maps from appearing in the voting system again for the next 2 hours of real time. So, for example, if your last two matches were on Dorado and Eichenwalde, you should not get these two for the next 2 hours.
The second change is about the mode. Before, Escore and Hybrid were always dominating, and you could have 3 Escorts or 3 Hybrids among the choices. In season 5, if two options are already Escort and/or Hybrid, the third one will always be a different mode. So you have more chances of getting at least one Push, Control, or Flashpoint on top.
This adds a bit more variety so you are not spending the entire evening running only King's Row and Shambali Monastery.
Will This Impact Your Waiting Time?
The problem it can cause is matchmaking taking much longer, because the game will essentially have to put together people who have already played similar maps. However, we personally played through season 5 for a few consecutive hours already, and so far, matchmaking did not seem particularly longer than before, even when playing with a full group.
Map pool is considered after it matches players together, so it does not really affect your waiting time. The game will simply check what maps everyone played and then make a decision on that with what is essentially left.
And with the 30+ different maps currently available, the pool is big enough to not cause any issues, so you do not have to worry about your waiting time.
It is definitely a good change because pretty much everyone can agree that we have had enough of running King's Row 20 times in the same evening.
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